


Third Daughter

by AfricanDaisy, KayleeArafinwiel



Series: The Iathrim Chronicles [1]
Category: Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Baby, Birth, Family, Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-08
Updated: 2012-09-08
Packaged: 2017-11-13 19:40:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/507025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AfricanDaisy/pseuds/AfricanDaisy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/KayleeArafinwiel/pseuds/KayleeArafinwiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A father reflects on the birth of his third child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Third Daughter

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that Kaylee and I have gone back to the beginning in terms of exploring the family history of Thranduil and Legolas. This story therefore contains just OCs, however canon characters will start showing up as the series progresses. Thank you to all who choose to read, and I hope that you enjoy reading this series as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

The Stars of Varda burned bright, bathing the hidden woodland realm of Doriath in pleasant heat and luminescent light. Animals basked happily, families took picnics beneath the trees, and young lovers swam and kissed in sparkling pools. To many of Elu Thingol’s folk it was a normal day, a day like any other – warm and fine and quite ordinary. For others, it was a day that would stay with them, even if tucked deep in their memories, for the length of their immortal lives. Two of these other people were Lord Brandir and his wife, the Lady Siliveth. She was in labour for the third time in her life, and he…well, he was not there with her. She had assured him she did not mind, and he thought it was likely true; at least, that was what he told himself as he stared down at his report for the King and tried not to grip his glass of wine too tightly.

He had attended the birth of their first child, and the entire ordeal had horrified him so much that he had shown his face in the birthing room less than an hour before the delivery of their next child. The screaming, the tears, his own helplessness…he was ill equipped to handle such things. Feeling so very useless and having to endure the shouting of ellith – having to endure being shouted _at_ – was, he didn’t mind silently admitting, damaging to his pride. This time, he had elected to feel useless at home, with his best and strongest wine close by to steady his nerves.

Yes, he was nervous, though not by the thought of becoming a father again; after thirty-six years of raising children, he knew very well what he was doing. What troubled him was the prospect of his wife delivering another daughter. Oh, he loved Miniel and Tadiel. He loved them deeply, more than he could say. They were his precious children, his girls, who he would not change for any son. But he did need _a_ son. He needed an heir, and surely, _surely_ , now was the time for it to happen. The odds had to be in his favour, he told himself. Though he was an only child, his wife had three brothers, and one of them already had three sons. It wasn’t as though only daughters ran in the family. Of course it was time for a boy, Brandir thought. He would have a son before the night was out.

Relaxing slightly, he drained his glass of wine and tried to focus on his work, a lengthy report which supported proposals to build a new road through the Forest of Neldoreth. It was not the most captivating task he had ever been given, especially considering the circumstances, and his mind repeatedly drifted until finally he was disturbed by a knock at the study door. It belonged to his youngest daughter, twenty-four year old Tadiel, who looked torn between nervousness and excitement. “Ah…Ada,” she began, bouncing lightly on her toes before a look from her father settled her. “Ada, there is someone here to see you. I think she is a healer…”

“Thank you, iel-nín,” Brandir said, rising fluidly. “I shall see her at once.”

The door opened a little further, and an elleth with fair hair tied back in a single long braid stepped past Tadiel. She had forgotten to roll the sleeves of her white healer’s robe down from her elbows, though they slipped back down anyway as she curtseyed to the King’s loremaster. “My lord, the labour is over. Lady Siliveth has delivered her child. She is greatly wearied, but well.”

“And our child, Healer Malwien?”

After a heartbeat of silence, the healer took a deep breath. “A healthy baby girl, my lord.”

Brandir’s heart plummeted, leaving him feeling uncomfortably hot in his blue-black robes. Resisting the urge to pull at the collar, he gripped the edge of his desk instead. “I…I see.” He exhaled, tightening his grip and watching as his knuckles went white. “Well. She is healthy. Good. I am glad to hear it.”

“Lady Siliveth is resting now, but she wished for me to tell you that she is sorry,” Malwien said quietly. “I do not think she will wake for a few hours yet, my lord, but perhaps you might visit your wife and daughter.”

The nod of acknowledgement from Brandir was absentminded, and he did not properly see the healer curtsey again and back out of the room to give him privacy. He stood in silence, stillness, taking it all in and accepting it. Another girl, he thought numbly. A third daughter, when everyone had been so sure that the longed for son would finally be his. The pictures in his mind had been of a silver haired, emerald-eyed boy, who he had taught to wield a blade, shoot an arrow, fell a stag. He had even started giving thought to names, wondering what his son would suit, and hoping for qualities that would stand his heir in good stead; patience, honour, courage, strength. Suddenly he gave himself a mental shake, pulling himself free from his thoughts as he strode from the study. “Tadiel,” he said sharply, hardly surprised when the girl appeared from around the corner. “Both your mother and sister are well. Tell Miniel for me.”

“A…a sister?” Tadiel repeated, her sea-green eyes going wide. “Nana said we would have a brother.”

Brandir rather thought his wife ought to be sure of things before promising them, but all he said was, “She was wrong.”

“Are you mad, Ada?”

“I am not ‘mad’, no. What happens, happens,” Brandir replied briefly. “Go now and speak with Miniel.”

With all the grace and dignity befitting a young lady of her station, Tadiel turned with an obedient ‘yes sir’ and walked sedately away from her father. The moment she heard the study door close again, she broke into a run and dashed upstairs, her skirt hitched up around her knees so her feet didn’t get tangled in it. “Min!” she gasped, bursting into the bedroom she shared with her thirty-six year old sister. “Min, Nana’s had the baby now!”

Miniel sat up quickly, setting her book aside without bothering to mark her place. “The baby has been born? That’s wonderful! Is he all right? Is Nana?”

“Oh, they are very well.”

“Your voice has that little smile in it, like it gets when you know something I don’t,” Miniel said shrewdly, looking thoughtfully at her little sister. “What are you not telling me?”

“Um…well…you know Nana said we would get a brother?” Tadiel began slowly. “We didn’t.”

“We didn’t get a…but you said… _oh_ ,” Miniel breathed. Her suspiciously narrowed eyes had suddenly gone round as she realised. “A _sister_?”

“Ada said he’s not mad, but…oh, I don’t know,” Tadiel sighed. “He didn’t _want_ another girl, Min.”

Echoing her sister’s soft sigh, Miniel hugged her. “He loves us, Tadi, you know that, but he needs an heir. I suppose he could always wait until one of us marries and name his son-in-law as his heir, but he doesn’t want to wait that long, and it’s not the same as having a son of his own. Still…” She drew back and smiled down at Tadiel, her dark blue eyes gleaming knowingly. “He will not need to think hard about a name. I’m quite sure I know what they’ll call her.”

“You do?”

“Yes, but we’re not to say it until the Naming Day,” Miniel replied firmly.

“Write it down, Min,” Tadiel implored her sister.

Lord Brandir’s eldest daughter went to the writing desk and drew a sheet of parchment and writing materials close. In black ink, she wrote: _First Daughter – Miniel; Second Daughter – Tadiel; Third Daughter – Neldiel_ , and she embellished the last name with little stars. Standing at her side, Tadiel nodded in understanding. “Oh, yes…yes, he’ll call her that. And, well, I know I probably shouldn’t say it, but I’m _glad_ we got a sister. We can dress her up like a doll, can’t we? We could never have done that to a boy.”

“Ada would have quite disapproved,” Miniel agreed with a wry smile. “I do hope we can meet her soon. We’ve waited ever such a long time for her to be born.”

“So has Ada,” Tadiel sighed. “I know he _told_ me he’s not mad, but…well, I hope he’s not _too_ disappointed.”

“Me too,” Miniel said softly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was a few hours before Brandir attended the House of Healing at the palace, leaving his elder and younger…no, middle…daughter alone. He trusted that Miniel could watch Tadiel for the short time he expected to be gone. The healers and apprentices going about their business bowed or curtseyed to the lord as he swept past them, but the usual congratulations and well wishes they would give a new father died on their lips as it occurred to them that maybe _this_ new father did not care to be congratulated.

The same golden haired elleth who had brought Brandir word of his daughter’s birth showed him to the recovery room, an airy place with a window carved into the wall and a view to an open-aired garden blanketed with white and pink lilies. His eyes went straight to the large bed hung with gauzy silk drapes, where his wife lay deep in slumber. Lady Siliveth looked peaceful, though pale and exhausted, her black hair tied out of her face. A few bits had slipped loose, lying across her cheeks. It made her look girlish and young, and as Brandir sat on the edge of the bed and gently stroked the strands back behind his wife’s pointed ears, he fleetingly remembered the moment he had first known he loved her. Their betrothal was already arranged by their families, and they had been slowly, dutifully, getting to know each other; then one inexplicable day, with a wondrous look from Brandir and a shy smile from Siliveth as she pushed her hair back from her eyes, they had fallen, and fallen fast. Siliveth was as glorious to Brandir now, in the aftermath of birth, as she had been that day; he wondered if she would feel the same, for he had heard it said that ellith did not feel very glorious after struggling through labour.

When there were no more loose strands to fix, nothing else with which to prolong the inevitable, the elf-lord took a deep breath and looked down into the cradle by the bed. The daughter who should have been a son lay there, and though Brandir knew that he loved her, knew he would die for her, an awful sense of disappointment gnawed at him. And he hated that. He hated that he was disappointed. Well did he remember how devastated Lord Gwathion and Lady Tatharien had been half a century before, when they had lost their unborn son. He would never forget their false smiles as they pretended it didn’t hurt any more, whilst their dead, defeated eyes told the truth. Now they had their Celepharn, a bright and beautiful little boy who was the centre of their world. But they would have no more. Tatharien could bear no more. What right, then, did Brandir have to feel _disappointed_ of all things when he had not just two wonderful, perfect girls at home, but a new little daughter to love and cherish? He knew. None.

“Hello, little one,” he murmured. “Welcome.”

The baby stirred slightly, and her long dark lashes fluttered as they lifted to reveal the most extraordinary eyes that Brandir had ever seen. Azure and emerald both, they looked like the blood of molten jewels; they looked like splashes of paint on an artist’s canvas; they looked like the calmest ocean that at any moment could flare into a tempest. And Brandir fell. He fell hopelessly, helplessly into their depths, his own eyes filling with tears that he did not even care about blinking away.

“Perhaps you would hold her, my lord,” Malwien suggested, from her place at the back of the room.

Brandir nodded mutely, and only vaguely aware of the healer retreating to give him space, he carefully took his daughter into his arms. She was as light as a feather, but when she grabbed his smallest finger, her grip was iron. “You are so very strong, my little one,” Brandir gasped, in delight, in disbelief. “It is hard to believe you were not born a son. And your sisters never attached themselves to me so.”

Movement from the bed caught his attention as Siliveth woke, and he turned in time to see her glancing away, her lashes lowered to hide her eyes. He spoke her name gently, and although she looked at him, he knew it was because she had been taught to obey her husband, not because she wanted to. “She likes me,” he said softly. “Our baby. She likes me.”

“She…she pleases you?” Siliveth asked uncertainly, her indigo eyes dark with doubt and worry.

“Oh, well.” Had Brandir’s hands been free, he would have given one of them a dismissive wave. “She may not be a son, but what matter is that? You would never know it from how strong she is. I am happy, beloved. And she is beautiful, exceptionally beautiful. Just like her mother.”

Siliveth ducked her head, but it was clear from her faint smile that she welcomed the compliment. “Perhaps next time, you will be telling me how handsome our son is.”

“It is not your fault,” Brandir said quietly, and he steadily held his wife’s gaze as she looked at him. “I was not angry. I am not now. If Ilúvatar does not grant us a son, we will not have one. We have three daughters, and I would change none of them, nor you. I love you and I am proud of you, and I am eternally grateful to you for the children you have given us to share. My beloved, beautiful girls, all of you.”

Though Siliveth blinked quickly, tears of relief slipped out at the uncharacteristic words from her usually reserved husband. “Thank you, my love,” she whispered, filing the words away in her memory like a folded poem in a locket, so she could return to them when doubt and guilt came upon her. She adored her stoic Brandir for setting aside his noble pride to voice the thoughts that he could have easily kept to himself, especially as she knew he would have felt so much more comfortable doing just that. Siliveth smiled at him, feeling soothed and rested. Those words were all she had ever needed to hear.


End file.
